Saturday, October 5, 2013

Report of the Fact Finding Team of Bandi Mukti Committee Visited Darjeeling on 18th and 19th September, 2013

As per the decision of
the State Executive Committee of the Bandi Mukti Committee a fact finding team
visited Darjeeling hills on 18th and 19th September, 2013
to have an objective assessment of the situation relating to arrest of
political leaders and activists of Gorkha Jana Mukti Morcha (GJMM) as well as
common participants in the recent agitation in support of their long-standing
demand of separate statehood.

Fact Finding Team (FFT)
on behalf of the Bandi Mukti Committee, led by the State Secretary Sri Chhoton
Das, comprised the following other members:

One of the
Vice-Presidents of the State Committee Prof. Ajit Kumar Ray, State Committee member
Dr. Arunkanti Biswas, State Executive Committee members Sri Bhanu Sarkar and
Sri Ratan De, Joint-Secretary of Darjeeling district Bandi Mukti Committee, Sri
Indranil Bhattacharyya and members of Darjeeling district committee Sri Arun
Ghatani and Sri Palan Chanda.

At
Kalimpong on 18th September 2013:

After reaching Kalimpong in the morning of 18th September, the
team met with Mr. Mohan Porel, Secretary, Kaliburang Unit of
Communist Party of Revolutionary Marxists (CPRM), Mr. J. B. Rai, Vice
President, Joint Action Committee, Mr. Sudip Pradhan, a member of CPRM, several
members of GJMM Kalimpong unit and common citizens in presence of
representatives of printing and electronic media at CPRM Kalimpong office.
After a brief introduction on team’s purpose of visit made by Prof. Ajit Kumar
Ray on behalf of FFT, the team had a long dialogue with all present there and
took note of the submission made by them. As Prof. Ray clarified in his
introductory explanation that the purpose of the visit of the FFT was neither
to support or to oppose the issue of Gorkhaland movement, the dialogue and
enquiry was confined only to collect facts on arrest of political activists, atrocities,
if any, by administration and law-enforcing agencies, condition of family
members of arrested activists, legal nature of charges against them, incidents
of violation of statutory procedure, if any, while arresting etc.

Being informed of the
visit of the fact finding team of Bandi Mukti Committee, the elected
representative from Kalimpong in West Bengal assembly, Mr. Harka Bahadur Chettri
came to meet the team and submitted his views before the FFT. Being invited to
meet a full delegation of GJMM in their Kalimpong office, FFT went to GJMM
Kalimpong office where advocate Mr. L. M. Chettri, who has been looking after
legal cases against their activists, briefed the team on the total scenario and
submitted a complete list of arrested activists who are in jail custody, police
custody or granted bail along with specific charges against them in Kalimpong
subdivision.

The team then went to
meet one of the arrested activists associated with GJMM Mr. Barun Bhujel, an
elected Municipal Commissioner from Ward no 16 of Kalimpong Municipality. He
was brought to be produced in the court of Hon’ble sub-divisional magistrate
Mr. Kamal Sarkar from Jalpaiguri jail. When Mr. Bhujel was brought outside of
Magistrate’s court room, members of FFT attempted to talk with him. Hon’ble
magistrate, however, denied the permission and the team could not complete the
discussion with him. However, the team had
a very revealing discussion with Mrs. Sabita Bhujel, wife of Mr. Bhujel, who
came to court with her little daughter for making arrangement of moving bail
petition for his husband.

The team visited the
residence of Mr. Kalyan Dewan, Professor of Kalimpong College and one of the
elected members of the Executive Committee of GTA. The team met Mrs. Gouri
Dewan, wife of Prof Dewan and came to know the following. While Prof. Dewan was
on his way to attend a public gathering in Darjeeling in his own vehicle on
August 12, 2013, he was requested by the police on civil dress to come to the
police station for a discussion with the IC. Once he entered into the police
station he was informed that he had actually been arrested. No warrant was
shown to him. His family members were not informed about his arrest by the
police. Prof. Dewan was sent to Jalpaiguri police station and was produced
before the judicial magistrate of Jalpaiguri court the following day. He is now
under jail custody at Jalpaiguri. Mrs. Dewan and her three school going
daughters have been able to meet husband/father only once during this one and
half month.

The team then visited
the residence of Mr. Nima Tamang, an elected member of GTA and met his wife
Mrs. Tina Pradhan (Tamang). The team came to know from his wife that police arrested
Mr. Tamang on August 15, 2013 at 5 p.m. from the Guest House of Uttarbanga
Krishi Vidyalaya (UBKV), Kalimpong. But, while he was produced before the
court, police reported that he had been arrested from a place near Nepal
border. Mrs. Tamang expressed her apprehension before the FFT members that
police have been trying to falsely implicate her husband with the charges of
maintaining link with the Maoist group of a foreign country in order to get
their support in favour of their on-going movement. In this case also, neither
the arrest memo was issued, nor was the arrest warrant served. His wife also
informed the team that the police, in order to prevent her husband from getting
out of jail custody on bail, have been continuously implicating him with newer
charges.

At
Darjeeling on 19th September, 2013:

The team reached the
office of CPRM Head office at Darjeeling. Mr. Chhoton Das, Secretary, Bandi
Mukti Committee explained the purpose of visit. The team then had a meeting
with Mr. Akash Thapa, Mr. Sunil Rai in presence of several media persons. After
completing the dialogue at CPRM office and taking note of every details of
arrested activists, the FFT then proceeded to visit families of few arrested
activists.

Meeting
with the family members of activists who are in Jail custody:

The team first visited
the residence of Sri Subhomoy Chattopadhyay.
Mr. Chattopadhyay, owner of the Darjeeling Tailoring House, is an
elected Councilor of Ward no 36 and also official spoke-person of GJMM. He was
arrested on August 13, 2013 at night12.15 a.m. from his residence without
producing any warrant of arrest. No arrest memo was also given at the time of
arrest. The team came to know from his family members that due to heart problem
Mr. Chattopadhyay has been transferred by the police to North Bengal Medical
College but no proper arrangement for treatment has been made by the
administration. All investigations suggested by doctors have been arranged by
the family members. Family members of Mr. Chattopadhyay have complained that
the administration has been trying to prove him as a mental patient and has
been administered medicines of mental disease. The situations of the family
worsen further due to issuing of arrest warrant against his wife Mrs. Anita Chattopadhyay.

After that the team
visited the residence of another arrested activist Mr. Narayan Pradhan. Mr. Pradhan
who is the Secretary of Darjeeling Town Committee, GJMM, was arrested on August
7, 2 013 at 11 p.m. from his house without any warrant of arrest. His wife Mrs.
Sabita Pradhan explained in details before the team how administration implicated
his husband in various new cases since the date of his arrest. Because of this
revengeful attitude of the administration he has not been able to come out from
jail custody in spite of granting bail by the judicial magistrate.

While the team was about to leave Darjeeling we received the information about the arrest
of Mrs. Nira Sharma, Councilor, Ward No-1 of Darjeeling Municipality. She has a
son and no body is there at home to look after the boy. Presently Mr. Amit
Chettri, a neighbour of Mrs. Sharma is taking care of the boy. Mr. Amit Chettri,
not being financially very sound, has been going through acute hardship in
order to maintain the additional burden of the boy.

The fact finding team
made every effort to meet police and administrative authorities but could not
succeed to get appointment of any of them.

The details of
submissions deposited at Kalimpong and Darjeeling before the team that includes
names of arrested persons, location of residence, location of jail, and sections
of charges of IPC etc are given in the Annexure-I and Annexure-II
respectively. However, following is a summary of general and common findings
that have been observed by the fact finding team:

a)List
of arrested activists includes elected representatives of GTA, college
professors, teachers, municipal councilors, students, unemployed youth, petty
businessmen, footpath hawkers and common citizens. Even an arrest warrant has
been issued against an ailing cancer patient Mrs. Goma rumba.

b)Very
few are named specifically either in FIRs or in general diaries of police, but
in several cases administration have mentioned citizens of certain localities,
like 41 Suruk Sampa, as unidentified persons whose figure run into hundreds. It
has created a sense of fear of possible arrest among the whole population of
that locality.

c)Each
and everyone was arrested without serving any warrant notice,

d)The
mandatory and legally binding procedure of issuing inspection and arrest memo has
not been followed in any of the cases of arrest.

e)None
of the arrested activists was given so far the status of political prisoners
and, thereby, everyone has been denied his/her rights and privileges.

f)In
spite of availability of space for jail custody in the hill, a large section of
arrested activists were sent to either Jalpaiguri or Siliguri jail. Considering
the time and financial constraint, it has been made difficult to visit arrested
activists at jail by the family members for a few and quite impossible for the
rest.

g)Though
it was agreed upon and had been included as a provision in section 29 of GTA
agreement that pending cases against all participants of Gorkhaland movement
barring the cases of murder would be withdrawn, many have been arrested now for
the old charges.

h)Documentary
evidences of several instances of imposing newer charges against a section of
arrested activists have revealed the vindictive and ulterior attitude of the
police and the administration. In order to prevent from getting out of jail
custody Police have been continuously implicating many with newer charges once the
court grants their bail petition.

Signatures of the
members of the Fact Finding Team on behalf of Bandi Mukti Committee, West
Bengal: